Italian PR agency SEC Group claims to be the first Western comms firm to enter the Iranian market since the historic lifting of sanctions earlier this month, signing a "co-operation agreement" to support Iranian consultancy and training firm PAT.

Analysis

"We've found the length of the video has become less important in terms of how long someone watches something. It's really about the content, and capturing your audience's attention in the first three seconds," says Heineken's Ron Amram.

The acquisition of Blue Rubicon and StockWell by Teneo Holdings last week has sent shockwaves through the industry. The scale of the ambition is huge: to set up a global City and crisis shop to challenge stalwarts such as Finsbury and Brunswick, and become the market leaders in this field. PRWeek assesses the impact on the industry as well as what it says about the health of the mergers and acquisitions market for PR agencies in the UK and beyond.

More than 700 Britons are believed to have travelled to Syria and Iraq to join Islamic State, as the group employs ever more sophisticated methods to radicalise young people online. The Government is concerned that existing programmes to combat radicalisation are failing to provide a coherent alternative message to counter the extremists, and are allowing them the space to present themselves as successful.